"Tango IX: Running your hand over it
to calculate its dimensions, you think
at first it is stone, then ink, or black water
where the hand sinks in, then a bowl of elsewhere from which
you pull out no hand."
"Today I have not won, but who can
tell if I shall win tomorrow?
So he would say to himself going down the stairs.
Then he won.
Good thing, because in the smoke of the room,
he had found himself wagering his grandfather's farm, which
he did not own, and forty thousand dollars
cash, which he did.
Oh, to tell her at once, he went slapping
down the sidewalk to the nearest phone booth,
5:00 AM rain pelting his neck.
Hello.
Her voice sounded broken into.
Where were you last night?
Dread slits his breath.
Oh no, he can hear her choosing another arrow now
from the little quiver, and anger goes straight
up like trees in her voice, holding his heart tall.
I only feel clean, he says suddenly,
when I wake up with you.
The seduction of force is from below.
With one finger, the king of hell
is writing her initials on the glass like scalded things.
So in travail, a husband's legend glows and sings."